


Reunion at the End of the World

by the_alchemist



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Brotherly Love, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-15
Updated: 2014-06-15
Packaged: 2018-02-04 19:17:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1790224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_alchemist/pseuds/the_alchemist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The world is going to seven hells in seven handcarts. But Jaime and Tyrion discover there are at least two good things left among the chaos: brotherly love, and booze.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reunion at the End of the World

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Alley_Skywalker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alley_Skywalker/gifts).



> Thanks to my three wonderful beta readers, R, S and A.

“Messengers, your Grace. With a gift.”

“Hmm?” The Regent of Meereen looked up from his books.

“From their Majesties, the Triumvirate of the Seven Kingdoms.”

“Oh.” The Regent hastily buttoned up his doublet, and ran his fingers through his hair. Well, a gift was good news. If things were really as bad as the last messenger had suggested, there wouldn’t have been a gift. There probably wouldn’t have been a Triumvirate.

 

“How long have you been at sea?” No matter how often he sat in state in the audience chamber of the Great Pyramid, the Regent could never get use to the sheer immensity of the place. But he took care not to let it show.

“Many months, your Grace,” said the sunburnt Captain. “It was ... not an easy crossing.”

“Well,” said the Regent, his heart sinking. “You must certainly accept our hospitality now you’re here.” Not such good news, then. The previous messenger must have overtaken them.

“We bear a gift from their Majesties,” continued the Captain. “And most especially from Queen Danaerys, first of that name.”

Since when were they ‘Majesties’ anyway, the Regent wondered. Even Joffrey had been content with a plain ‘Grace’. Was this the Stone Dragon’s doing? He had found it hard to believe the rumours: the young Queen had seemed so unsure of herself last time he saw her, meek and ready to defer to her older, beautiful co-rulers in all things. Then again, the Regent knew better than anyone how deceptive that could be.

“I humbly thank their Majesties,” said the Regent. Then, because the Captain seemed to be waiting for more, “please, bring it forth.”

But it wasn’t an ‘it’, it was a ‘him’: a scrawny, ragged man with an unkempt mane of dirty yellow hair, whom one of the ship’s officers pushed so hard onto the carpet that he fell sprawling on his face.

It was then that the Regent saw that the man’s right hand was missing: his wrist ended in a shiny, jagged scar. The Regent rose from his throne, not certain that he recognised the prisoner until the latter raised his head and smiled ruefully. Then: “Jaime?”

“Tyrion,” replied the prisoner. “It’s ... been a long time.”

 

Tyrion’s first instinct was to have the Captain thrown in prison, but then he recalled that last, dreadful night before Danaerys left, and his parting words to her: “There’s nothing left in the world I want now, except perhaps to complete my revenge.” So the Captain was sent away with some courtiers to be given food and wine, and Tyrion descended from his dais, and helped Jaime, if not quite to his feet, then at least to sit up.

“What do you need first?” said Tyrion. “Food? Drink? Sleep?”

“Forgiveness,” said Jaime.

Hearing that word chilled Tyrion’s spine. Only a few months ago he had asked for the same thing, and he gave Jaime the reply he himself had received. “It was yours already.” But in his voice there was warmth, loneliness, and longing, and in Tysha’s there had been disdain and a terrible finality. I have forgiven you, but forgiveness is not friendship, and I ask one thing only of you, that I might never see you again.

It would have been fitting, Tyrion supposed, to have said the same to Jaime. But the cares of a ruler had eclipsed the passions of a lover, long months had dulled the sharpness of his anger, and something like an exile’s loneliness had made the sight of – yes, of a beloved brother – more welcome than a hot bath after a long day’s riding.

“Come,” said Tyrion. “You shall have the room next to mine.”

Jaime tried to stand, but captivity, hunger and exhaustion had proved too much for him, and he sank back to the carpet.

“Jaime ...” Tyrion embraced his brother while motioning to some courtiers to help him.

“Sorry,” said Jaime. “I’ve had a rather trying time of it lately.”

“Don’t mention it,” said Tyrion. “If I hadn’t decided not to be a tyrant, I would have you sit on the floor all the time, so that whenever I was in need of a brotherly embrace I would have access to something other than your knees.”

 

That evening, they supped together in Jaime’s room, Jaime in bed, Tyrion at a table beside him.

“I was sorry to hear about Cersei,” said Tyrion. And Tommen. And Myrcella. And the others. They weren’t quite the only Lannisters left, but it was close.

“I wasn’t,” said Jaime. But after a short pause he continued. “No, that’s not true. I was. Of course I was. I hated her by the end, and she despised me, but still, sometimes it feels unnatural to keep on living without her, like some essential part of me is gone.” He looked down at his right arm and smiled. “Some other part of me, I mean.”

They ate and drank in silence for a few minutes.

“How did you hear about her?” asked Jaime.

“There were messengers,” said Tyrion. “You took your time getting here.”

Jaime smiled. “I escaped,” he said. “Twice. And the second time I was away for three weeks before the Captain caught me. But after that he chained me up in the hold and kept me on short rations.”

“Well, here you will dine like a king,” said Tyrion. “Or at least a Regent.”

“You’ve done well for yourself,” said Jaime, looking around the sumptuous bedchamber. “I ... always knew you would. Father was an idiot not to see you were the best of us.”

Tyrion wished he could have known in his youth that he would one day hear that. It might have cheered the poor lad up a bit. Now it meant nothing. “The world,” he said, “is monstrously debased. It is only fitting that those of us who are debased monsters should rule it.” He had meant it as a joke of sorts, but it rang hollow.

“In Westeros, you could be hanged for saying that,” said Jaime.

“Yes,” said Tyrion. “I have heard that the Stone Dragon is a little sensitive about her appearance.”

Jaime snorted. “Did you ever meet her?” he said. “In the old days, when she was just little Shireen Baratheon, I mean. Before–” Before what? The story went that her father had attempted to sacrifice her to his foreign god, but the flames had refused to burn her and she had come out carrying a sword of fire. Jaime felt foolish for crediting it, but he had seen Stannis’s body, and that of the red priestess as well. “Before she killed her father,” he said.

“Before she killed her king,” Tyrion corrected him.

Jaime laughed. “I hadn’t meant it as a gibe,” he said. Then something occurred to him. “What else have you heard,” he said.

“How do you mean?”

“There have been messengers that left Westeros after me, yes? Well, what news?”

Tyrion sighed. He had meant to conceal it until Jaime was a little stronger, though come to think of it he was already showing signs that his disgusting ability to recover from any physical weakness was undiminished. “None good,” said Tyrion.

“Well?”

And he told him all he had heard: tyranny and rebellion; fields, castles and cities razed to the ground by dragonfire; the two queens at odds. King Aegon was never seen in public any more, and rumours prevailed that he had died walking through fire to try to prove he really was a Targaryen and not just some exiles's bastard. And in the North, there were worse things yet.

Jaime’s face had grown increasingly sombre as Tyrion spoke, but at the last piece of news, he smiled again. “White walkers?” he said incredulously. “If–”

But Tyrion interrupted him. “If the word ‘grumpkin’ or the word ‘snark’ is about to proceed from your mouth, may I remind you it’s not only the case that for the first time in my life I might have some chance of beating you in a fair fight, it’s also the case I have a palace full of guards and I only need to speak the word and–”

“All right, all right,” laughed Jaime, holding up his hand. “Pray continue, your Regentness.”

“One thing more,” said Tyrion. “There is a new leader in the North, a shapeshifter, by all accounts. And an old friend of yours.”

“A friend?” Jaime frowned, puzzled.

“Next time you decide to push a child out of a tower,” said Tyrion, “you might do well to make sure he lands head first.”

And then Jaime’s blood ran cold. He had thought – hoped – that the rumours of White Walkers meant all was false, but Bran was a different matter. He had seen him in his dreams, again and again, a boy who was a direwolf and a direwolf who was a boy. “It’s ending,” he said quietly. “Not only knights and kings, but knighthood and kingship themselves. Our world. Everything.”

“Yes,” said Tyrion. “I think it is.”

“And what’s left?”

They both reached out at the same time, and their hands touched briefly. “Brotherhood?” suggested Tyrion. “And also half a cellar full of Arbor Gold.”

 

Very early the next morning, Tyrion awoke to find himself using his brother’s belly as a pillow. They were lying on the floor of a summerhouse in one of the palace gardens, a cask of wine upended nearby. His mouth was so dry that when he tried to lick his lips, his tongue seemed to stick to them. Outside, he heard the tantalising plashing of a fountain, but standing up – even sitting – was an impossibility.

He heard Jaime groan beneath him and rolled off so they were lying side by side. Jaime took him in both arms, squeezed him tightly and slurred something about brotherly love.

Tyrion tried to rub his eyes, but his sleeves had somehow grown twice as long in the night. No. He was wearing the shirt that had been found for Jamie. And nothing else. And it appeared that Jaime had tried to put on his – Tyrion’s – breeches. They reached as far as his knees.

Then Tyrion was distracted by a cup somewhere near Jaime’s head. He reached out: it turned out to be still half full of Arbor Gold. With the confident manner of someone who knows he is doing entirely the wrong thing, he used it to wet his dry mouth.

Then he must have slept again, because he remembered being woken for a second time, this time by Jaime’s voice. “How much did we drink last night?” he asked. Then: “Why in the name of the Seven are we wearing each others’ clothes?”

Good questions, both. And both altogether better to dwell on than the other questions. What’s happening over the sea in the place that was once our home? What will happen to us? When this is over, what will be left?


End file.
